Belize Camping Experience Concludes its Summer Camp

For the past sixteen years, the Belize Camping Experience has been hosting summer camps in communities across Belize City. Youths from across the country are brought together at its headquarters for three weeks to become part of a core team that would go into the community spreading positive messages to kids from south side neighbourhoods. This year, the theme of the five-week summer camp is “Hope.” The camp concluded today and News Five was able to stop in for the final session.

Janellie Blanco, Head of Youth Development, BCE

Janellie Blanco

“Throughout the summer, starting in the month of July, we have summer day camps, which means that every week for the past five weeks we have been having two camps. In the mornings, two vans move from our base and we have a camp in Albert Street/Cleghorn Street and next week, we have Jane Usher/Gungulung. So that’s what we have been doing and we are here today at south side. There’s a lot of things that tell us that we live in an evil and broken world. Even this week, there is a state of emergency happening all around this specific neighbourhood and the fact that we can have programs like this. This church is in a specific area; it is at the corner of George Street and Mex Avenue. And we’ve had kids, I think today has been seventy-five kids overall that have come. they’ve felt loved, they’ve felt listened to and I think one of the things is that we don’t want them to give up on their dreams.”

Trenton Richards

Trenton Richards, Youth Development Officer, BCE

“I always had the passion to come out and share the gospel into the community and the theme that they had for this year, which is hope. And I am like why not, especially in a broken community where people don’t see hope, where people look to things that are hopeless when there is true hope in Christ. So why isn’t that a passion that someone would want to do? Share the gospel in broken community, share the hope of Jesus.”